Nokia’s smartphones running Microsoft’s Windows Phone operating system have outsold its Symbian handsets in the UK this year.

Popularity finally switches over to Microsoft's operating system

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Nokia’s smartphones running Microsoft’s Windows Phone operating system have outsold its Symbian handsets in the UK this year.

According to Bloomberg, which cites research by Kantar Worldpanel, 2.5 percent of UK consumers bought a Windows Phone device compared to 2.4 percent opting for Symbain.

Dominic Sunnebo, an analyst at Kantar said, "The fact that Windows Phone sales have overtaken Symbian based on one handset is encouraging. However, Nokia will need to expand the range quickly in order to keep up with the slew of next generation competitor products being launched in quarter two."

One of the biggest causes for this turn around was the Nokia Lumia 800 which accounted for 87 percent of Windows Phone 7 sales in Europe, according to Kantar. Nokia previously launched the N9 with Meego but chose not to bring it to the UK.

Nokia vowed to support Symbian until 2016, recently announcing the Nokia 808 PureView at Mobile World Congress (MWC) which runs on Symbian and has a 41Mp camera. The firm also announced a number of Windows Phone handsets including the Lumia 900 and Lumia 610.

Nokia and Microsoft must still battle against Google’s Android and Apple’s iOS devices which are still way out in front.

Comments

Claude Bucher said: Comments,Claude Bucher,you are even more moronic then Flop, aren't you?it's not m$ gaining over Symbian, it's Symbian getting to the m$ level, thanks to Flop's harakiri1½ years ago Symbian and Maemo had nearly 25% of the UK marketnow, NOKIA has less then 5%...what an improvement, isn't it?

Maccyroo said: Comments,Maccyroo,Symbian had a good run and a loyal core of mostly business users, but the writing has been on the wall for some time. Also Microsoft has handed over a lot of money to Nokia to help the company decide to "champion" Windows phones rather than any other mobile alternative.